FEAST OF THE ASCENSION/(SIXTH SUNDAY OF EASTER) 2026

MAY 17, 2026

FR. JERRY THOMPSON

ST. JAMES’ CHURCH, FREMONT, NE

Happy Easter to you, as we continue to celebrate the Great Fifty Days of the Easter Season!

This morning we’re marking the Feast of the Ascension, which was actually Thursday,

forty days after the Day of the Resurrection.

We hear both of Luke’s versions of the Ascension, one from the Gospel of Luke and the other from the Acts of the Apostles.

We at St. James’ have an additional reference for the Feast of the Ascension, that is, the beautiful window at the rear of the nave .It depicts Jesus ascending, looking upward,

while the Holy Spirit looks downward toward him.

The three always work hand in hand, Jesus and the Holy Spirit, with the Father, too,

just as we heard in last week’s gospel reading, You might remember Jesus saying, “I am in the Father and the Father is in me.” And it’s from the Father that the Holy Spirit likewise comes forth.

The three work together all the time, and because the Holy Spirit is at the heart of the church, empowering us and enlivening us, we are part of that same life, too. To the degree we choose to live in Christ, as Christ lives in us, we are part of the life of God.

Our window also reflects some of the closing words from our gospel this morning: “Then [Jesus] led them out as far as Bethany, “and, lifting up his hands,  “he blessed them. “While he was blessing them, “he withdrew from them and was carried up into heaven.  “And they worshiped him, “and returned to Jerusalem with great joy; “and they were continually in the temple blessing God.”

Our window depicts Jesus blessing his followers as he ascends into heaven.

And, here we are, like those early followers, worshipping Jesus, filled with great joy, in our temple blessing God.

We continue what we have inherited from those early disciples, those early followers and companions of Jesus our Lord.

At this point in the church year, like those early followers, we await the coming of the Hoy Spirit. We celebrate that coming next week on the feast of Pentecost - so be sure to wear your red!

Two important warnings stand out to us in the Acts of the Apostles. Before Jesus ascends, the disciples want to know if it is the time when Jesus will restore the kingdom to Israel. They’re still focused on worldly power; that’s how they understand the world –

and, based on current events in our own nation, it’s how a number of people who claim themselves to be followers of Jesus still understand the world: in terms of their own power rather than in terms of the cross and the power of God.

However, the pursuit of worldly power is not of Jesus Christ. As God, Jesus has all power and authority, so why would he expend an ounce of energy pursuing it?

Even more importantly, he wants to show us that our pursuit of worldly power is unfaithful. We who follow him are called to trust in him, not in ourselves; to trust that he is exercising his authority over the long haul to the glory of his reign.

And, holding such trust in our hearts, to pursue, as Jesus does, the kingdom of God

that is so very different than worldly power, so very different from the kingdoms of the world and worldly power as we most often experience it being pursued and exercised.

So in response to their question, “Is this the time when you’re going to restore the kingdom to Israel,” Jesus tells his followers: it’s not your job to focus on such things.

Your job as my followers is to be my witnesses to the ends of the earth.

There’s a good amount in life to be concerned about, just as those early disciples were anxious about what God was up to and when. But just as was true with those early disciples, we first of all don’t need to worry about our lives; we need to place our faith in God.

And secondly, it’s not our job to run the world any more than it was their job.

What is our job? The same as theirs.  To witness to Jesus to the ends of the earth.

Through our words and our deeds, by the choices we make as individuals and as a community. It is our job to witness to Jesus.

You might remember that the Greek word “martyr” actually means “witness.” We’ve come to associate martyrs mainly with those who die because of their faith. But the word was applied to those who die because they were giving witness, as we all are called to do as followers of Jesus.

We all are called to offer our entire lives to him and thereby give witness to the reality that he is indeed the Lord of our lives, the only one in whom we place our ultimate trust,

the one to whom we look for guidance in how to spend the time and other resources

we have been given by him.

That goal of giving witness to Jesus is to be foremost in our hearts.

The second warning comes at the end of the reading. Jesus is ascending, and he is taken out of the sight of his followers.

However, they remain standing there, staring up into heaven.

That’s when two men in white robes – much like the ones at Jesus’ grave after the resurrection – these two white robed men appear to the disciples.

“What are you staring at?” the men ask. “Jesus is gone for now. “He’ll come back at another time, “much like he left you.”

In the meantime, you need to get on with serving him and witnessing to him with your lives; with the choices you make, with the way you spend the time and money and other resources he has so graciously given you.

In the post-communion prayer we most often use, we ask God to “send us into the world . . .granting us “strength and courage “to love and serve “with gladness and singleness of heart”.

If we’re following Jesus, we don’t spend our earthly lives staring into heaven, as if the goal is to be there rather than here. The scriptural vision of the consummation of all things is, after all, not an escape from this world but rather a transformation of this world

into the fullness of God’s kingdom, where God reigns over the lives of people - because we choose that reign “on earth as in heaven,” as we pray each time we pray that prayer Jesus gave us.

And because we are a part of that transformation, we serve Jesus where we are, here,

in the world into which Jesus sends us – the world in which we witness to his remarkable life and death, resurrection and ascension; a world in which we witness to the love that pours forth from the heart of God, so that love may also pour forth from our own hearts in the shape of the self-sacrificing cross, in the giving and spending of our lives in the service of others as we serve our God..

Jesus now lives fully with the Father, completely united with him. As he makes so clear in the gospels, has always lived in communion with him, but now that union includes our humanity in a different way than before.

The Father has claimed us in a way he had not before. We live with him, in communion with him, here and now, just as Jesus does and always has. Because Jesus lives in us,

and we live in him.

And during this time before Pentecost, we wait with the disciples. We wait in this world so much loved by the Father that he saves it through his only Son Jesus Christ. We wait with those early disciples for the Holy Spirit to come into our lives anew and to change them, to change us, to renew us, to enliven us, to draw us ever more deeply into new ways of service, new forms of ministry, new ways of life in which we belong more and more to our Lord Jesus – until he returns to claim us - and the whole creation – entirely as his own, as it always has been, and it always will be.

Amen.